


The Rewards of Patience

by Archaeopteryx



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Aftercare, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Blindfolds, Blow Jobs, Bondage, Dom/sub, M/M, Oral Sex, Praise Kink, Shibari, Sub Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd, Subspace, Teasing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:28:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23521579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Archaeopteryx/pseuds/Archaeopteryx
Summary: The scarf tightened, knotted securely behind his head, with a careful sweep of a hand along the back of his neck to keep his hair free. Before he could feel even a prickle of nerves, Dedue's hand cupped his chin, lifting his face to what must have been eye level."You trust me," said Dedue."I trust you," said Dimitri.Dedue prefers to move at a slower pace than Dimitri, and tonight, his is the pace Dimitri will have to put up with.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Dedue Molinaro
Comments: 11
Kudos: 130





	The Rewards of Patience

The scarf slipped over his eyes — well, eye — and the world went still.

It tightened, knotted securely behind his head, with a careful sweep of a hand along the back of his neck to keep his hair free. Before he could feel even a prickle of nerves, Dedue's hand cupped his chin, lifting his face to what must have been eye level.

"You trust me," said Dedue.

"I trust you," said Dimitri. The truth of it sank into his bones like molten gold: hot, bright and heavy, quieting the anxious flutter of his heart. Dedue kissed him, his lips dry and chapped with winter, his breath warm against Dimitri's mouth. Dimitri sighed, returning the kiss as the tension melted from his shoulders.

He swallowed a whine when Dedue vanished, but he remained seated on their bed, legs tucked beneath him. His ears pricked at the sound of a drawer opening, then closing. The mattress sank under Dedue's weight; his palm caressed Dimitri's cheek, and his lips met Dimitri's once again.

"Patience," Dedue murmured when they parted.

"I'm _not_ patient," Dimitri complained.

"You shall have to be." Dedue's voice lifted, amused. Dimitri didn't need to see to know how the corner of his mouth ticked upwards, so subtle it could slip unnoticed or be misread as irritation to those who did not know him well.

By the goddess and all the Saints, Dimitri loved him.

Dedue tugged on Dimitri's shoulder. "Turn." Dimitri shuffled around, so that he knelt on their bed with his back towards Dedue. "Good."

Dedue's hand settled on Dimitri's back, palm flat against the nape of his neck. He shivered, hair prickling, as the hand trailed downward. Dedue's fingertips traced his spine all the way to the start of his tailbone, and then up again, neatly-trimmed nails retracing the line he'd just drawn. Both palms smoothed over Dimitri's shoulderblades, drawing away any lingering tension, then ran down to rest on his hips. Dimitri sighed, head tipping back — and then squeaked, startled and in no way dignified, as Dedue pulled him into his lap. But Dedue wrapped his arms around his waist and held Dimitri's back flush against his chest, _oh_ so warm and solid, so Dimitri had no complaints.

"My Dimitri," Dedue murmured. His hands slipped between Dimitri's thighs, nails scraping so slightly above the tendon, thumbs stroking the taut muscle and ignoring Dimitri's cock even as the blood rushed downward. Dimitri whined, arching into the touch, and his whine only rose in pitch when that touch disappeared. "Patience," Dedue reminded him.

"You're cruel," Dimitri complained, but with a monumental effort he forced himself still.

"Good," Dedue said, so low it resonated in Dimitri's chest. For reward, his fingertips trailed over a long scar that slipped from Dimitri's hip down his inner thigh — nearly a tragedy for Faerghus, that one. Dimitri groaned, but he kept his hips from moving. " _Good_ ," Dedue repeated, approving, and that — that was the only thing that mattered.

He bent his head, pressing a kiss to Dimitri's shoulder — Dimitri tensed. He knew that spot: one of the wounds from Gronder Field, a short but thick scar, one of many that should have taken his life. He winced when Dedue dragged his tongue across it, not because it hurt, but at the bitter reminder of his violent life. Hard to hang on to that thought when Dedue kissed that scar again, this time with just a hint of teeth.

"My Mitya," he said. "My lion. So handsome, so proud." Dedue's palm ran back up Dimitri's side — his blind side, where the worst of his scars clustered, as if Dimitri could have doubted his meaning.

"They're not … "

"Shh."

Dimitri snapped his mouth shut.

"Maybe to a stranger," Dedue said. He hooked his chin over Dimitri's shoulder and wrapped his arms around him, one palm flat against his sternum, the other tucked close around his waist. "But they are part of you. They are proof that you have lived your life according to your principles as best you could, no matter the hardship. I love you for that, and because I love you, they are lovely to me."

Hard to believe otherwise, held so securely, the world still and quiet but for Dedue's voice in his ear.

"Do you understand?"

Dimitri ran his tongue over his teeth, retrieving his voice from the deep pocket into which it had slipped. "I understand."

Dedue swept the loose tails of the scarf over Dimitri’s shoulder and kissed behind his ear, breath whispering over that fragile skin. “Good.”

His hand slid up Dimitri’s neck, cupping his chin to lift it, palm against Dimitri’s throat. Dimitri’s heart fluttered, his breath coming fast and shallow. He gasped when Dedue nipped at the side of his neck, just above another scar — one of _Dedue’s_ scars, earned at their meeting, old and stretched but unfaded. Then a kiss, soothing the fever that rushed up into his chest, and then another careful bite, delivered not to harm but to mark. A silent statement: _Mine_.

Dimitri prayed that with his squirming, his hands clutching desperately at nothing and his cries at every nip, bite, kiss that tracked the scars along his back and shoulders, he made his answer clear enough: _Yours_.

They went on like that for — minutes, muttered the rational part of Dimitri's mind, stuffed into a box and packed away in a dusty corner; hours, weeks, years felt the rest of him, lost to Dedue's wandering hands, Dedue's mouth on his back. Soft reprimands and softer praise grounded him when he would buck and thrash, when the whispers crept in at the edges of his mind. Kisses to his shoulders, to his neck; anchoring, possessive bites to remind him to whom he belonged, in whose hands his mercy rested; tongue to soothe the bruising marks and trace his ragged scars. Hands on his thighs, his chest, his belly, his neck, fingertips so light as to be barely felt and the sharp, careful scrape of nails, and nothing for the one place most in need of attention. Dedue seized Dimitri's wrists with gentle steel when his own hands drifted there, unthinking and desperate. Dimitri sobbed, gasping, "Please — please — "

Dedue hummed, dragging out the pause. "Will you be good?"

"Yes — "

"What was that?"

"I'll be good! Please … "

"Then hands _off_."

 _Awful_. Dimitri could _weep_. But he clutched at the sheets when Dedue released him, more desperate to obey than for that touch. More than any selfish pleasure he needed, he _needed_ , to be —

"Good."

He gasped as much as if Dedue had touched him, praise a warmer surge of joy than any hand could give him. He threw his head back against Dedue's shoulder, eyes shut behind the blindfold. Dedue's free hand slid up his belly, over the trembling ridge of his ribs, to rub his thumb over the bright hot point of Dimitri's nipple. Dimitri moaned, panting — he could feel Dedue hard against his rear, his lover’s trembling and labored breath, so why not — ?

"Patience," Dedue said, which was a mistake. He pulled Dimitri closer against him, and he gripped Dimitri's chin with such immovable gentleness, and his voice hummed low through Dimitri's chest, and — Dimitri's hips bucked. He cried like a lone hawk, and distant wind roared in his ears, and he spilled himself over his thighs.

"Wait," he mumbled through the haze as he realized what had happened. His breath hitched, a sob caught on the bleary edge of panic. "Wait, no — no no no, sorry, I'm sorry, I — "

"Shh." Dedue kissed his temple. "You think I would finish with you so quickly?"

Relief like a cool cloth to his fever, nudging his scattered thoughts back into line. He shook his head, reached for a deep breath, wriggled so he could kiss Dedue’s evening-rough jaw. (If that meant shifting his thigh against Dedue’s cock, if that meant a gasp and a shiver in Dedue’s chest, and if that put a smug-cat grin on Dimitri’s face, then — who could hold that against him?) “L-let me make it up,” he said.

Dedue tugged at the tail of his blindfold. “Should I … ?”

“No, no.” Dimitri slipped from Dedue’s arms and turned — and turned a little further, his grin turning sheepish, when Dedue took his shoulders and corrected him. It meant, at least, that Dimitri did not have to fumble around to take Dedue’s hand and guide it to the back of his head. “Show me.”

That little catch in Dedue’s breath — this was the joy of the blindfold. Dimitri had long since learned to watch Dedue’s hands, his chest, his shoulders; to listen for the subtle shifts in voice and breathing that hinted at what other men showed with their faces. Without the distraction of sight, his world narrowed to the surface of his skin and Dedue’s voice; to the smell of him, the floral soaps he liked undercut by salt sweat and the musk of sex; to the heat of him, melting through Dimitri like a hearthside nap on a winter's day. Those cues became _everything_ , and if Dimitri would claim more control over what happened tonight, he would crawl back into Dedue’s lap and curl up against him, kiss his pulse and feel it leap as he stroked Dedue to completion.

But that was not the order of tonight’s business. Instead, he waited, quiet at least if not patient, while Dedue cupped his face in both hands and kissed him, tucking the stray strands of his hair behind his ears. He nipped at Dimitri’s lip and slipped his tongue into his mouth — proving ever so stubbornly that tonight’s pace was his to set, no matter that Dimitri could feel him quiver like a drawn bow.

Even Dedue could not wait forever, though, and soon enough (not soon enough for Dimitri’s liking, though that was the point) he threaded his fingers into Dimitri’s hair, and leaned back, and tugged him down, and down, and down.

He kissed Dedue's thighs, and hummed, pleased, as they parted for him. He took his time, leaving his own marks with tongue and teeth, smiling against that delicate skin at each whine and shiver until Dedue tugged on his hair, drawing out a soft moan. "Patience," Dimitri drawled, and won himself another tug on his hair.

Very well. Dimitri had little taste for teasing, but Dedue was right: patience had its rewards, like the low groan when he ran the tip of his tongue along Dedue’s shaft. The shudder and arch of Dedue's back as Dimitri placed a delicate kiss to his tip, the tightening of the hands in Dimitri’s hair when he took Dedue into his mouth. Dedue's calves over his shoulders, heavy and strong, trembling with each swipe of Dimitri's tongue. _Patience_ , so he let Dedue guide him, keeping him slow and steady while Dimitri's mouth and tongue did the work.

Dimitri did not always trust his hands. They were too strong, too damaged, too beaten into tools of violence to entrust with the careful work of sex. He trusted his mouth, though, liked to think his so-called golden tongue was good for more than polished words. It was hard to believe otherwise when Dedue gasped, when he shuddered, when he yanked on Dimitri’s hair and filled his mouth with hot and sticky fluid.

Dimitri swallowed, lifted his head, and, smiling toothily, licked a few stray drops from his lower lip. Dedue cupped his chin in a sweat-dampened hand and drew him up for a long kiss.

Dimitri forgot, sometimes, about taste, but he knew it meant something for Dedue to taste himself in Dimitri's mouth. Whatever it was, he wrapped his arms around the small of Dimitri’s back and held him close to his heaving chest. “I’m sorry about your hair,” he murmured.

Dimitri nuzzled against Dedue’s collarbone. “Shh. You know I like it.”

“Even so.” Dedue ran a careful hand over Dimitri’s hair, kissed his forehead — and rolled over, pinning Dimitri beneath his weight. “And who are you, telling me to shush?”

Oh, the shiver that rattled down Dimitri’s spine. He grinned into the dark. “You're not done with me, then?"

"By no means. Tonight, your Majesty, you are _mine_ , and I mean to make thorough use of you." Dedue put the loveliest weight on _mine_ , fierce and rumbling at a depth that sank into Dimitri's spine and unwound every fear and worry. He rose — Dimitri complained at the sudden chill. Dedue only tugged on his wrist. "Up."

"Yes, sir," Dimitri said, smirking. A sound caught in Dedue's throat, and his hand stilled.

Then he gripped Dimitri's chin, forcing it up, and pressed his thumb into one of his marks until Dimitri moaned. "Impertinent. We shall see about that."

"Oh, I hope so."

"Hush. Or should I gag you?"

 _That_ was a thought. But — they'd had a plan for tonight, and however the idea made Dimitri's heart skip, being blind _and_ speechless was a bit more than he could stomach without the chance to brace himself. "Another night, maybe."

"Hm." Dedue's hand shifted from a firm grip to cupping the side of Dimitri's face. He kissed Dimitri, muffling a startled noise, and tucked a stray lock of hair behind his ear — it slipped free almost immediately, but the thought counted. "I love you."

"I know. I love you, too."

Dimitri should ease up on the teasing. He liked to be handled a bit roughly, but … Dedue worried. He balked, went quiet and careful in his way, when he feared he'd gone too far, no matter how often Dimitri reassured him that he would know if he'd crossed a line. It frustrated Dimitri, at times, to be handled so gently — he wasn't an ornamental eggshell or a spun-sugar delicacy, about to shatter at a moment's notice — but … at times, it was nice to be treated as though he might.

It wasn't what he wanted tonight, though, and he relaxed when Dedue drew a breath and lowered his hand. He guided Dimitri to the edge of the mattress, positioning him so he knelt with his back to the room. His hand brushed over Dimitri's shoulders, sweeping his hair forward and baring the back of his neck for a delicate brush of lips.

Then he slipped off the bed and disappeared.

Dimitri made a questioning noise, head turning uselessly. He couldn't track Dedue's movements without his weight on the mattress or the shift of sheets. Alone in the dark, each minute whisper of cool air against his skin and every hint of real or imagined sound amplified a thousandfold. He smoothed his palms down his thighs as his pulse quickened.

 _Patience_ , Dedue would tell him. He measured his breathing, let his shoulders slacken and his hands rest loose on his lap. His eyes sank shut beneath the blindfold. Nothing mattered but the steady, loping gait of his heart.

A touch shot through him like thunder — Dimitri yelped, bolt upright. His heart hammered, but Dedue kissed the top of his head, coaxed Dimitri to lean against his belly. A wall at his back, warm and firm. Dimitri reached up, and Dedue took his hands, twining their fingers together. Though he couldn't see Dedue's face, he tipped his head back, hoping some of the untamed love, the peace, the _safety_ shone through.

"Don't go," he whispered. Dedue squeezed his hands.

"I'm sorry. I had to straighten some things. Are you ready?" A long loop of — _something_ brushed against Dimitri's front, and his pulse leaped again, this time in excitement.

"Ah … one moment." Supporting himself against Dedue's front, Dimitri stretched one leg, then the other. His knees had taken enough of a beating over his life, and they complained if they spent too long bearing his weight. When they no longer tingled and the ache had subsided, he tucked his legs back beneath him. "There. I'm all yours, my love."

Dedue's hands slipped to Dimitri's wrists with an iron grip; he drew them down and crossed them behind Dimitri's back. A — rope, that was it, light but strong linen cord, coiled around them, knotted deftly and securely. Dimitri flexed his hands, testing, and curled his pinky finger into Dedue’s when prompted.

“Test your shoulder,” Dedue said. Dimitri sighed, but obeyed, rolling his bad shoulder. Even years after the end of the war, the wound still troubled him on occasion, sending pins and numbness into his fingers. To his relief — he very much wanted this, and was growing impatient — the joint cooperated.

“It’s fine.”

“Really?”

“ _Really_ ,” Dimitri whined. He scowled at Dedue’s chuckle. “Tease.”

"Hm. Move," Dedue said. Dimitri shuffled towards the center of the mattress, giving Dedue space to climb up once more and sit behind him. His chest pressed against Dimitri's back, and he wrapped the arm not still holding the ropes around Dimitri's waist. His lips brushed Dimitri’s ear. “You must be patient, my dear king,” he purred, smug as a cat with a favorite toy, “or you will wait even longer. Will you be good for me?”

“Ye-es,” Dimitri sighed. Dedue kissed his temple.

“Good.”

 _Good_.

Dimitri sank into Dedue's hands, pliant as soft clay. His breath flowed soft and even. Nothing to do, nothing in his mind, but to relax and be held while Dedue positioned him as needed. The rope wound around his shoulders, his chest, up and down his back; its cool embrace steadied him as surely as it bound him. His arms secured to his sides, his wrists behind his back, the firm grip around his ribs as his chest rose and fell … he could snap these bindings if he tried, but he did not care to try when he was so comfortable. Dedue's fingers slid beneath the ropes, testing the tension and dressing the knots, ensuring each cord lay neatly in its proper place. Each touch set _Dimitri_ in his proper place, ordered the chaos in his mind, secured him within the confines of his skin.

The finishing touches tightened the ropes around Dimitri's chest. He mumbled surprise when Dedue's hands moved to his legs, but waited, quiet, while Dedue bound each of his ankles to his thighs, pausing to caress the thick muscle. For once, finally, Dimitri did not have to force patience: all things would happen in their time, and that time was Dedue's to determine.

“How is it?”

Dimitri arched his back, drew a deep breath, rolled his shoulders against the ropes. Tight — confining, but not constraining, no part of his body drawn beyond what it could bear. He felt no hint of any chill or tingle, not in his knees nor his bad arm. " … good," he sighed, with a hint of pleased whine.

"Mm."

Dedue's fingers brushed once more against Dimitri's shoulders, lightly tracing the lines of his handiwork. Dimitri's breath shuddered — he squirmed, trying at once to recoil from and lean into a touch so light it cracked through him like glass. The rope bit into his skin when he shifted, and he moaned, already aching.

"Shh," Dedue murmured. He kissed the side of Dimitri's neck, impassive to Dimitri's strangled whimper; trailed his index finger with torturous delicacy down the back of Dimitri’s neck, kneaded soothingly at Dimitri's steel-taut shoulders, and — forced him down against the mattress. Startled, Dimitri squawked, but he stilled as Dedue leaned forward. One hand pinned the back of his neck; the other gripped the column of rope between his shoulderblades, while Dedue's knees bracketed Dimitri's waist.

"Patience, your Majesty," he rumbled, his breath hot against the shell of Dimitri's ear. "You are lovely, and I mean to savor you."

Goddess, oh, Goddess, how could he be patient with his cock trapped between his belly and the sheets? Dimitri squirmed, desperate for friction, hoping perhaps to coax Dedue into some relief by grinding his rear back against Dedue's cock. Dedue jerked at his bindings.

"Stop that," he warned.

Dimitri stopped.

His heart thundered, feverish. Dedue pinned him like a scruffed cat. Nothing passed in the dark but Dedue's weight and the measured swell of his breath.

Fair enough. He'd tried to push past the pace Dedue had set, and so he would have to wait. With a monumental effort of will, Dimitri steadied his own breathing, letting his blood begin to cool.

At last, Dedue relented. "Good," he said. Dimitri sighed. " … but you may need a reminder."

The hand on his neck disappeared. Dimitri tensed, ears pricked. A soft _clink_ of metal launched his heart back into eager pounding. Cold brass trailed ever so lightly across his shoulders, setting every hair on end, and he startled with a cry muffled in the sheets.

"You know what this is," Dedue said, abominably kind for someone who'd bound Dimitri hand and foot and pinned him to their bed. The brass dragged back across Dimitri's shoulders, jolting where it crossed the lines of rope. He shivered as he nodded. "Tell me, so I may know that you know.”

Damn him for making Dimitri _talk_ in this state, so wound-up the whole world seemed to quake with him. They would go nowhere until he found his voice, though, so he swallowed, coughed, and croaked, "C-collar."

"Good." Approval, warm as the brass was cool.

The buckle lifted, vanishing into the dark, only to reappear at the small of his back. Dimitri jerked, muffling a cry that sank into a long whine as the metal slipped up along his spine.

It paused.

Dimitri had just drawn half a breath when the buckle reversed direction. His chest constricted, and he sank his teeth into the sheets as the wind rushed out of him. Dedue’s hand replaced the buckle, soothing the chill with the caress of warm skin.

“Lovely,” he murmured, flattening his palm against Dimitri’s spine. Dimitri arched into the touch — Saints, he prayed Dedue didn’t judge this too impatient. Dedue must have felt forgiving; he continued to trace gentle patterns across Dimitri’s bare lower back, content, it seemed, to watch Dimitri squirm and whimper. “My handsome lion. My king of beasts. Would you like to be tamed?”

Face buried in the mattress, Dimitri nodded.

"What was that?"

"Ye-e-es," Dimitri whined.

"Yes, what?"

" _Please_ — "

Dedue sighed. Panic scratched at the inside of Dimitri's chest, but Dedue wasn't so cruel as to let him flounder. "Tell me what you want," he said, ever so patient.

Bastard. "Collar," Dimitri grated through his teeth, grasping for words that scattered like beads off a broken string. "On. Me." _Now_ , he barely stopped himself from adding. "Please," he begged instead, praying that the ragged edge on his voice might earn him some pity.

"Good."

Soft leather and cool brass slipped around Dimitri's throat. The buckle sat neat against the back of his neck as Dedue cinched his collar snug. Dimitri sobbed with the relief of it.

" _Very_ good," Dedue rumbled, combing his fingers through Dimitri's hair to free any unruly strands of the collar. Stars tingled down Dimitri's back. He bent to kiss Dimitri's nape; Dimitri barely managed a shiver, slack and panting within his bindings. "Oh, Dimitri, I have been hard on you.” His fingertips trailed up the line of Dimitri’s jaw. The touch sparked. “You have been patient, and you have been brave, enduring so long for me. Are you comfortable?"

Dimitri nodded, mumbling bleary affirmation. Dedue slipped his fingers into one of Dimitri's bound hands. Dimitri squeezed. Dedue squeezed back.

He leaned down even further, hands braced on either side of Dimitri's shoulders. His hot breath whispered against Dimitri's ear. "Then I believe you've earned your reward."

He shifted behind Dimitri, which meant that his thigh and cock rubbed against Dimitri's rear, provoking a weak moan. A cork popped free of glass; Dimitri just about came then and there. He didn't, though he whimpered into the sheets at the sound of pouring liquid, and his whole body twitched when Dedue's oiled fingers settled once more on his lower back.

"What would you like? Should I ride you?"

Dimitri liked that, but … he liked to see Dedue when they did that, to watch him rock himself with his eyes glazed and his head tipped back, all gold and silver in the light of the sun or the hearth. Without sight it lacked some of the appeal.

His pause proved indecision enough, it seemed. Dedue stroked his back. "Or would you like me inside you?"

 _Goddess_ , yes! Dimitri nodded, breath quickening. "P-ple — ase?"

"Shh, my Mitya. At ease. If that is your wish, then you shall have me."

"Th'nk you," Dimitri mumbled through the whine that seeped out of him. Dedue hummed.

"Thank me when I'm done with you."

If Dimitri had a response to that, it dissolved. Dedue's hands slipped down, pausing to trace gentle circles on his hips, to squeeze the muscle of his thighs and the thick curve of his rear, until finally, _finally_ , his fingertips brushed at Dimitri's entrance.

Where they paused.

Dimitri _sobbed_. Desperate instinct kept him from bucking back against Dedue's hand. "Very good," Dedue said gently, running his free hand over Dimitri's back. "So obedient, my lion. So tame when you are at my mercy. You've done very well."

He tugged Dimitri up by the back of his harness, easing the angle on his hips — ah, they twinged. Dimitri hadn't noticed until his position changed. He shifted, doing what he could to relieve the strain on tendons that had cramped in place, and hissed at the sting.

"Are you alright?"

He nodded. "Ye-es," he added, before Dedue could ask him to say it. A bit of ache was nothing. It would fade when he got the chance to stretch, and he wanted to finish this.

"Mm. Very well."

More oil spilled down Dedue's fingers and dripped over Dimitri's most sensitive skin. He rubbed careful circles around Dimitri's entrance, drawing out reserves of Dimitri's voice he hadn't known existed. Dedue — grunted, but he quickly kissed Dimitri's shoulder, easing the sting of worry. Whatever the cause of his momentary irritation, it slipped from Dimitri’s mind.

Dedue's free hand settled on Dimitri’s waist. "Shh, Dimitri. You've been — so very patient — and I don't wish to deny you longer, but neither will I cause you pain. Trust me, my lion, and I will take care of you."

Still the collar rested snug against Dimitri’s neck, as much a promise as it was a binding. "Trust you," he echoed, hoarse and breathless. "Trust you."

"Good," Dedue murmured, as he slipped the blunt tip of one finger inside Dimitri.

Dimitri gasped — all the breath rushed from him — he crumpled forward. If Dedue hadn’t caught hold of his harness he would have collapsed completely, too far gone to support himself as he writhed within his ropes.

“ — alright?”

Dimitri caught the tail end of Dedue’s urgent question. He nodded, frantic. “Don’t, don’t, don’t — ”

“Don’t what?” Fear. Love. Care. Dimitri sobbed, scraping for speech that escaped him.

“Don’t s- _stop_ ,” he whined.

“Oh,” Dedue sighed, a raw edge to his voice. "Oh, Dimitri. Just be patient a little longer.”

Patient. The thought seemed unbearable, with Dimitri’s every nerve alight, with his heart beating at his ribs as if it wished to escape.

But for Dedue, he could. For Dedue, he could do anything. Be anything.

Dimitri nodded.

“Wonderful,” Dedue murmured. Dimitri’s hips jerked. Dedue tugged him back; his free hand rested on the center of Dimitri’s chest, steadying him. His other palm traced circles on Dimitri’s lower back, but he returned quickly enough to where he’d left off rather than forcing Dimitri through the painstaking process all over again. Each time Dimitri’s hips stuttered, as he saved himself from taking more of Dedue’s fingers than Dedue had deemed him ready for, Dedue rewarded him: with kisses to his shoulders and his neck above the collar; or by rubbing his free hand across Dimitri’s chest, stroking Dimitri’s nipples until he cried like a seabird; or, best of all, with more of that gentle praise.

By the time he'd worked Dimitri open to three fingers, his own breath had turned ragged. The hand against Dimitri's chest trembled, and the rewarding kisses turned slower, hotter, with teeth against the marks Dedue had already left or tongue lapping at the sweat that streaked Dimitri's shoulders.

"Are you ready?" Dedue asked, hoarse. Dimitri nodded frantically. By the Goddess and all her Saints, he had never been readier.

Dedue's fingers slipped free of him. Dimitri could have wept at the emptiness. He _did_ sob when Dedue's hands disappeared, leaving him shaking in the lonely air. "Don't go," he begged, "I'll be good! Please don't go — "

"Hush, Dimitri. I have you. You're doing well." The cork popped again. "But I need to, _ah_ — prepare myself … "

The low groan as Dedue must have taken himself in hand drew a sympathetic one from Dimitri. He startled when Dedue grasped his hips and lifted him up, drawing Dimitri back towards him; he took hold of the back of Dimitri's harness, leaving Dimitri hanging on his knees while he positioned himself against Dimitri's entrance.

"Shall I?" he asked. Dimitri nodded.

"P-ple — _ah — !_ "

His voice stuttered up to a pitch he hadn't known it could reach as Dedue let Dimitri sink onto his lap. He slipped into Dimitri with little resistance — oh, the sweetest possible burn, the relief of being full again, warmed inside and out — Dimitri threw his head back with a long, low moan. Dedue's breath shuddered, and he whined softly against Dimitri's shoulder. "Ah, Dimitri — Dimitri — "

Dedue's fingertips traced circles on Dimitri's belly. Sparks danced across Dimitri's skin, spots of bright color in the dark. The fingertips slid to his sides, where the skin apart from his scars lay thin and sensitive, and he could not even buck against the piercing sensation. Dedue's palms slid up to the base of his ribs, then back down to squeeze his hips; then up, then down, then up again, wringing weak cries from Dimitri's chest. He trailed his thumbs down the center of Dimitri's abdomen, petting at the line of hair that led down to Dimitri's cock without ever coming near. Dimitri's thighs jerked at another delicate touch, parting by instinct.

"I am going to move," Dedue murmured. He began a gradual rocking, shifting inside Dimitri with agonizing grace, still not enough and yet so much more than Dimitri could bear. His chest heaved, his breath ragged, but he would not speed his pace. Dimitri quivered like a bowstring atop Dedue's cock, panting — he could not move, not with Dedue's knees parting his bound thighs, with his arms pinned against Dedue's chest. Dedue stroked Dimitri's thighs in slow, intricate patterns until Dimitri wept prayers to the Goddess, to the Saints, to Dedue himself. His own cock ached with neglect, hot pre-come dripping from its tip, and his disobedient body cried and shook in its bindings, but Dedue kissed his neck and whispered _sweet thing, handsome lion, so brave, so strong_ , and that was better than any blessing a goddess might have offered him.

Dedue could keep him here forever if he wanted, blind, bound and aching, suspended in his need without hope of release. Dimitri could live like that, if only Dedue would touch him once in a while, brush his palms or his fingertips against Dimitri's skin, or hold him, steady him and keep him safe. If only Dedue kept calling him _patient, good, lovely_ in so low and kind a voice, telling him how well he'd done, was doing. Dimitri would choose that over his own pleasure in a heartbeat.

So he was lucky that Dedue had other designs; that even Dedue's patience could not last forever.

Dedue hooked his fingers into the ropes around Dimitri's thighs, spreading him further, and bit down on Dimitri's shoulder — as if he needed to, as if Dimitri was not wholly his, collared and crying his name like a plea for mercy when he could form words at all.

"You are mine," Dedue whispered low against Dimitri's neck. "Let it be known, your Majesty, and let it never be forgotten. _My_ Dimitri. My lion. Your trust and your mercy, given freely to _me_."

Dimitri tipped his head aside. Dedue obliged him with a nip above his collar, drawing out a shudder and a choked gasp. "Yours," Dimitri panted. "Ah — ! Yours! Yours. Always and in all things, yours."

Oh, he wanted — to be held in trust, to _belong to_ , to be precious in such a way — he could imagine no greater peace. If the whole of Faerghus, of Fódlan, could know how he had given himself to the most wonderful man beneath the Blue Sea Star — a vision flickered through his mind's eye so vividly he nearly mistook it for real, and he liked it well enough to string a sentence together.

"On the — oh, the throne — you could have me, love — like this. Just like this," he breathed, stuttering through Dedue's steady rhythm. His blood burned as he indulged the fantasy: blind and bound, writhing and willing in Dedue’s lap on the very seat of Faerghus’s power, before every sneering fool who would deride all they were and had ever been to one another, who would deny Dedue his rightful place by Dimitri’s side. "Show the whole c-court that I — I am yours — body, blood and _oh, Saints — !_ "

Dedue buried his face in Dimitri’s shoulder and thrust deep into him. Stars burst across the dark beneath the blindfold. He hadn’t expected to affect Dedue so, but — the thought melted as Dedue wrapped his arms around Dimitri’s chest. His breath shuddered, raw, and he clutched at Dimitri like a drowning man.

"Enough," he gasped. "This is enough."

Their new pace fed Dimitri's need back into bonfire desperation, his ache into bright agony. He squirmed, seeking relief; the movement wrung a long whine from Dedue that skipped up in pitch when Dimitri clenched around him. He strained against his ropes, frantic — he couldn't even support himself with his legs so bound, had no way to control the bucking of his hips, utterly at Dedue's mercy even as his lover's steady rhythm grew erratic and stuttering. If — if he could hear that sound again — feel it in Dedue's chest — he could do little but ride Dedue's thrusts, but he was not totally helpless. The soft moans of _good, good_ against his shoulder stoked sweet-burning heat in his belly. Cries spilled from his lips without rhyme or reason, _please_ and _more_ and _Dedue, Dedue — !_

Dedue hooked the ring of Dimitri’s collar with two fingers. His other hand slid down Dimitri’s ribs, over his belly, between his hips and _Goddess, finally_ around his neglected cock. Dimitri’s hips jolted; recoiling only thrust him further onto Dedue, rewarding him with such a lovely whine. He reeled forward again into Dedue’s hand and a sharp tug on his collar, and rocked back just as Dedue clutched at him and came. His ragged cry tipped Dimitri over his own edge — one of his legs kicked free with a _snap_ of rope, and if not for the grip on his collar he would have lurched off Dedue's lap altogether. Heat surged up through his chest and into his throat — he arched back into Dedue's chest. The world flashed white and sun-hot as his voice cracked raw.

He seeped back into his skin with his head limp against Dedue's shoulder, Dedue's arms around his ribs, rocking him slowly as they both caught their breath. Soft kisses against his neck. Wet, fluttering breath.

"Can I … ?" Dimitri asked, hopeful.

"Can you what?"

Saints, not with his eyelids fluttering and his heart so full and warm, not with the rope still secure around his chest. "Hand," he mumbled. "Mouth. Please?" he added, dimly aware that it clarified little.

Dedue understood his hazy stammering, though. He lifted his hand to Dimitri's mouth, letting Dimitri lap himself up. He drew Dedue into his mouth with an eager moan, tongue curling around the pads of his fingers, and whined when he felt Dedue shiver. Dedue's other hand slipped back between his legs, petting lightly at his thighs. His fingertips ran the length of Dimitri's cock before curling gently around the head; somehow, Dimitri's body found the reserves to come again, hips twitching weakly as his head lolled back against Dedue's shoulder. Dedue let him clean that up, too, though there wasn't much, and he kissed Dedue's palm when he was done.

"Was I — was I good?" he croaked.

"Wonderful," Dedue murmured, his own voice hoarse. "My Dimitri, my lion. So good."

"Yours," Dimitri agreed, dazed, spent, warm. So warm. Such a wonderful thing, the way their bodies could fit together. " … Love you."

A muffled bolt of alarm shot through his chest when Dedue sniffled, but he only squeezed Dimitri tighter. "I love you, too."

He kept one arm around Dimitri's waist as he cleared away the snapped ropes and unbound Dimitri's other leg, massaging away the rope marks. Dimitri hissed at the ache in his knees when he stretched, but he tipped his head against Dedue's shoulder before he could worry. "'s fine," he mumbled. "'s good. S-stay?"

“ … Mm.” Dedue sounded about as dazed as Dimitri felt. He lifted the blindfold over Dimitri's forehead. Even the dim light made Dimitri's eye water, so he closed it. He whined when Dedue shifted him off his lap to untie him, but there was relief in rolling his shoulders, in shaking out his wrists, in stretching his arms to admire the patterns pressed into his skin. He bit his tongue on a whimper when the mattress creaked and Dedue’s weight disappeared, but he tracked the sound of footsteps to the creak of a tap and a rush of water.

Soon enough, Dedue returned. A warm cloth cleaned the sweat from Dimitri’s back and shoulders and the spend from his thighs and belly, like rubbing down a hard-worked horse. He guided Dimitri back onto his lap, to curl up with his head on Dedue’s thigh and the quilt nestled around his shoulders; stroked Dimitri's hair, brushed the teary wetness from his cheeks, and murmured praise and soft endearments while Dimitri's head slowly cleared.

His own chest hitched, and his belly trembled behind Dimitri's scarred shoulders. "'s it alright?" Dimitri asked, now more hazy with sleep than with the quiet place in his head.

"It is." Dedue's hand stilled on the curve of Dimitri's bicep. "Did you like it?"

"M-hm. Very much."

"Oh. Good." Muted.

Dimitri's brow furrowed. He wriggled until he could see Dedue's face from the corner of his good eye. "Did you?"

Dedue's hand resumed its gentle path along Dimitri's arm, like stroking a cat. He felt like a cat, pleased as a notch-eared tom curled up in the sun. "I did."

Ah, Dedue — his voice bore just a bit of tension. Dimitri tugged on the ring of his collar; the corner of his mouth quirked up, and he hummed. “It can stay.”

His eye gleamed with mischief as Dedue’s breath caught. “For tonight, if you’d like.”

Dimitri stretched, fingers laced together as he arched his back. “I would like,” he purred. “Maybe tomorrow, too. I’d wear a scarf, of course. But we’d know.”

The silence grew long, broken only by the beat of Dimitri’s heart, until he began to worry he’d pushed too far, but before he could open his mouth to apologize, Dedue lightly swatted his shoulder. “You are teasing me.”

“Maybe.” Dimitri rolled onto his back, and added, “I joke. I do love this — this game of ours, but I would not take it from the bedroom. I don’t wish it to be all we do.” He loved just as well when things went the other way, when Dedue would entrust himself to Dimitri’s care, or when they did not complicate the matter at all and simply enjoyed the joining of bodies. And — yes, when he entered that state, that quiet place in his head, he could want nothing more than to remain like that forever, but his rational mind recoiled from the thought. He would not put Dedue in such a position, to bear such a burden and be unable to put it down.

… and he had sniffed out the source of the unease in the air. Dedue bent to kiss his forehead. “I don't wish for that, either. It is a lovely game, but I would not play it forever."

Dimitri reached up and laced his fingers over the back of Dedue’s neck. “Mm. And I can wait until you wish to play it again.” He leaned up for a kiss, awkward and messy at an ungainly angle, and grinned. “Waiting is part of the fun.”

“Only because it ends.”

“It’s a balance.” Dimitri yawned. “Now will you lie down, or do you mean to sleep sitting up?”

Dedue’s fingers slipped along the band of Dimitri’s collar, brushing his hair back from the tender skin beneath his jaw. “ … actually, I would prefer we do away with this for the night.”

“Mm, but I’d have to sit up,” Dimitri groaned. He did so anyway and swept his hair aside, baring the back of his neck so Dedue could undo the buckle and slip the leather band from his neck. It went back in the drawer of their bedside table, tucked within the folded scarf along with the neatly coiled ropes. Dimitri curled his arm around Dedue’s shoulders when he turned back, tugging him down to the mattress. “Sleep,” he whined.

“Hmm … we should change the sheets — ”

Dimitri hauled the quilt up over them, wrapped both arms around Dedue’s neck and slung one leg over his hips. “ _Sleep._ ”

Dedue chuckled, the bastard, but he draped one arm over Dimitri’s ribs and nuzzled into his chest. “Sleep,” he agreed. Dimitri huffed, but settled onto the pillows and let his eye drift closed.

Most nights, Dimitri’s sleep came slowly, recalcitrant like a half-wild barn cat.

Tonight, warm and weary, he did not have to wait.

**Author's Note:**

> My first ever Porned Ography ... a true PWP ... thanks to the FE3H rarepair discord, as always, and [casualbird](https://archiveofourown.org/users/casualbird/) for beta. Am I a real fanfic author now?


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